I will be arriving in Stuttgart on Feb. 9th to attend a trade show and will be free starting the afternoon of 11th for 6.5 days until catching a flight back to US on 17th out of Stuttgart. This is my first trip to Germany. Can anyone recommend a crash itinerary to experience a bit of Germany? I don%26#39;t mind short(up to 5 hrs) train trips. I enjoy local people including food and culture, classical music, history and just looking around. Please help!
Oh, while at it, any recommendation for a hotel less than $100 within 10 km from Stuttgart Fair(Convention) Center with will be welcomed. Thanks!!
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Actually there are a number of possibilities: I would recommend either a southbound tour (Alps and hiking, %26quot;traditional%26quot; culture). Starting in Stuttgart, I would take an ICE to Munich stay there for 2 days for museums, shopping and sightseeing, going to Füssen for seeing a few castles and ending in Salzburg, Austria (beautiful and very scenic city with possibilities for hiking, to experience some classical music should not be a problem, too.)
An alternative would be a northbound tour. From Stuttgart, I would go to Heidelberg and/or Trier (a lot of history, castles etc.). The Rhine Valley would be my next stop, even though February can be a pretty dull month, possibility of rais is quite high) and I might want to end in Cologne (for the Dome and the chocolate museum (not to be missed!)).
These are very personal preferences. You have hundreds of other options. I%26#39;m sure MarcoPolko will tell you what you can do around Stuttgart at that time. In the end, you will have to decide what to miss. Have fun!
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First, about a Stuttgart Hotel. We always recommend to our visitors which we can%26#39;t house to stay at the moderately priced City Hotel near our apartment (about US$100). It is a 5 minute walk to the absolute center of Stuttgart, and to the Klllesberg Messe on the U-7 the U-bahn stop is a short block away and less than a 10 minute trip. There are two less expensive alternatives nearby, the Espenlaub Hotel and Alex 30 Hostel. All three hotels use the U-bahn Olgaeck stop. While at the Messe, take a walk to the tower in Hohekillesberg Park which is interesting in itself and also offers what I consider to be the best view of Stuttgart (if it is snowy or icy you won%26#39;t be able to climb it). I always take visitors on the old style U-15 up (several hundred meters) to Ruhbank by the TV tower (world%26#39;s oldest, 50 years in February) for the winter snow and views from the hillsides and also to briefly see one of Stuttgart%26#39;s forests. On the way back, get off at Budenbad and walk down the Georg-Elster Staffel to the Suenderstaffel back to the hotels. The staeffele (stairways) were used originally to give access to the vineyards on the steep hillsides, but now serve to connect the streets where roads cannot be built. Central Stuttgart has hundreds of them. Many, such as the Suenderstaffel have nice small parks on the hillsides (good view). A flower market is held on Schillerplatz and a fruit and vegetable market on Marktplatz Tues, Thurs, Sat and a nice flea market weekly on Sat on Karlsplatz. The Markthalle with its delightful sights and smells of excellent food from around the world shouldn%26#39;t be missed. Besides the TV tower, Stuttgart also has some other architecturally famous places.
You can easly spend all your time sight seeing within 100 km (60 mile) of Stuttgart. I recommend taking a city tour of Stuttgart by foot or by bus available through the city tourist office, as besides seeing the sights you will also be learning some history. The Mercedes Benz museum is excellent but the Porsche museum will largely only appeal to their enthusiasts. Wilhelma combination zoo-botanical gardens is nice for its Moorish architecture, and there are three thermal baths as Stuttgart has the largest ones in Europe after Budapest. Particularly nice places accessible by U-bahn are the largest perfectly preserved baroque palace (Swabian Versailles) in Germany in Ludwigsburg (two other smaller nearby palaces also) and the old town center of Esslingen. Almost any town at the end of a S-bahn will have fairly good sights and can be worth a couple of hours visit. The Staatsgallerie art museum is excellent, as are Stuttgart%26#39;s opera and ballet if you can get tickets and if there is a performance. You can go to the top floor of the new Kunstmuseum (modern art museum) for free to have a good view of downtown Stuttgart.
After seeng the area surrounding Stuttgart accessible by public transportation, rent a car to visit more outlying places because they might not be too accessible by public transportation. The fairy tale-like castles just to the south are wonderful, Hohenzollern (Hechingen) Castle and Lichtenstein Castle, with the nice clff-side scenery of the Schwaebische Alb as a bonus. The ancient monasteries at Maulbronn (to the NW) and Bebenhausen (to the S) are both excellently preserved and could be coupled with visits to the college towns of Heidelberg (Maulbronn) and Tuebingen (Bebenhausen). To the NE you can visit the walled city of Rothenburg ob der Tauber, and perhaps couple it with a visit to Schwaebische Hall (nice old town and modern art museum) and nearby walled Comburg monastery which are about half way there. To the east is Schwaebisch Gmuend which will be excellent if they have a Guggenmusik event at that time. To the SE is Ulm wth its record height climbable cathedral tower. To the SW is the northern part of the black forest.
As to food, make sure to try the swabian specialties Maultaschen and Kaesespaetzle, to me the best of Swabian food. For an excellent dinner, try Der Zauberlehrling in the Bohnenviertel, our favorite Stuttgart restaurant. The Schellenturm, originally a tower on the city wall and then a prison, has excellent ambiance. Stuttgart also has a large number of Michelin starred restaurants.
The things I listed will easily fill up all of your time and much more. There really isn%26#39;t a reason to travel all over Germany to see things unless there are other things that you really want to see. All of these local places mentioned are wonderful.
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Where I mentioned U-bahn to Ludwigsburg (S-4,S-5) and Esslingen (S-1) that should have been S-bahn.
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Thank you, MarkK and Marcopolko.
You made me so excited about my trip now. This probably is not the best time to travel Germany, but how easy(or adventurous) is it to rent a car and wonder around for the first timer, regarding weather, road, expenses, etc.? And also, is there easy public transportation access from the airport to City Hotel? Thanks.
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The transport from airport to city is very good. There is an S-Bahn train every 10 min (appr.) into the city. Ask your hotel which stop you should get out.
Renting a car and wonder around is a possibility too, but unless you know exactly where you want to go, and how, you will end up spending faaaar too much time seeing residential and industrial areas, agricultural landscape and all the stuff that is necessary but not interesting for a tourist. Using public transportation is like having a driver :-)
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First, from Stuttgart airport into town catch the S-bahn at the airport (S2 or S3) and get off af Stuttgart Hauptbahnhof (train station). Take the U-5, U-6 or U-7 (direction Ruhbank, Degerloch) to Olgaeck (3rd stop). Exit, walk toward the back of the train, turn right crossing the tracks and the street (Charlottenstrasse) and go up the side street by Neukauf grocery store to the next street (Uhlandstrasse) and turn right. The hotel is on your right 50 feet up the street. It%26#39;s a nice quiet street. To go to the Messe, return to the U-bahn stop, but the near-side this time, and catch the U-7 to Killesberg Messe (less than a 10 minute trip). During the week, U-bahns and buses are every 10 minutes, S-bahns every half hour or every quarter hour during rush hour.
The shortest, easiest way walking into town is to go back down Uhlandstrasse a few blocks to the city library (Stadtbucherei), turn left on Urbanstrasse (La Piazza restaurant ahead is a good inexpensive place for pasta, but don%26#39;t order pizza), turn right on the walkway before the bulding, and go down the U-bahn entrance and exit by the opposite entrance which will nicely and safely get you across one of Stuttgart%26#39;s busiest intersections. The new palace is now to your right, and old palace will be to your left. Koenigstrasse (main pedestrianized shopping street) is a short distance ahead (as is the Schlossplatz). The tourist information office is up this (to right) on the right hand side opposite the train station. The tower of the train station also has a free viewing platform.
February is an excellent time to visit as there will be few tourists, and in some places you might be the only tourist. This has happened to us in Bebenhausen monastery in February. (It probably won%26#39;t be that cold, but I would wear footware that can handle slush, and rain is always a possibility.) Car rentals will be less if you don%26#39;t pick up your car at the airport or train station. Make sure it has snow tires. Bad weather (heavy snow) is rare, and you should have few problems driving except possibly for traffic in large cities. Get yourself a good map or maps. If you like, I could meet you at the City Hotel and give you further advice, it%26#39;s only a block from our apartment and we park our car a short distance away from it.
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Hi nadaum!
If you decide to rent a car, you should do it in advance. I would recommend to rent with one of the big car rental companies (Avis, Sixt and the like). Make sure that you get a tariff that includes unlimited mileage (most tariffs do that).
Most foreigners I have spoken to told me that travelling on German motorways is something you must get used to (remember, there is no speed limit in most parts, so there will always be a bigger, faster car behind you, no matter how fast you go.). On the other hand they said it was fun and a worthwhile experience on its own. The road system is very good, but roads tend to be much more jam-packed than in the USA (due to the higher population density and Germany being a transit country in the heart of Europe) and streets in cities and towns are much more narrow (I couldn%26#39;t believe how much space there was when I first drove in the USA!). You need to decide for yourself, if you live up to what awaits you, but I%26#39;m sure you can manage.
One more thing: In Germany it is much more common to have cars with manual transmission. So, if you are not used to this, make sure that you rent a car with automatic transmission. I have read in a post of a user here that they are much more expensive though.
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Hi you all again!
Is Heidelberg worth a day trip? Can it be done for a day? Is there a public transportation that will allow me to take a day trip to Heidelberg either on Sunday or Monday? For renting a car, do they honor US driver%26#39;s license? Are there places to pick up a car other than airport? Pardon my ignorance, what is the difference between S-bahn and U-bahn? If possible, I wish I can squeeze in a day trip to Heidelberg and maybe two days, overnight trip to Munich by ICE before flying out of Stuttgart on Friday. With great excitement, Thanks!!
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%26gt; Is Heidelberg worth a day trip?
Yes. It%26#39;s one of the most visited cities in Germany.
http://www.cvb-heidelberg.de
%26gt; Can it be done for a day?
Yes.
%26gt; Is there a public transportation that will allow me to take a day trip to Heidelberg either on Sunday or Monday?
Of course.
DB timetable
http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en
A good deal is the Baden-Württemberg Ticket
bahn.de/regional/…MDB17734-ba_wue_011105.pdf
Valid one day for all local trains in Baden-Württemberg. On weekdays however only past 9am. Covers also nearly all other local public transport, e.g. trams and buses in Stuttgart and Heidelberg.
1 person EUR 17,00
2-5 persons EUR 24,00
Most scenic is the route along the Neckar to Heidelberg. On this route there are anyway only local trains.
You can force this route by giving %26quot;Neckarelz%26quot; as a via station into the DB timetable.
%26gt; For renting a car, do they honor US driver%26#39;s license?
The rental companies: yes
But strictly seen you need also a translation (= international drivers license)
germany.info/relaunch/…driving.html
%26gt; Are there places to pick up a car other than airport?
Yes. But cheaper will it be only if you not rent at the airport and not at the main railway station.
Just check the sites of the rental companies for branches in Stuttgart.
If you can also return in Stuttgart:
http://www.interrent.com/
%26gt; Pardon my ignorance, what is the difference between S-bahn and U-bahn?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Bahn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-Bahn
With a local public transport ticket (or e.g. the Baden-Württemberg Ticket) you can use all types of local public transport:
- local trains (RB, RE, IRE)
- S-Bahn
- U-Bahn
- trams
- buses
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It is a bit late, but I would like to thank you all for your input. Now I have pretty good idea about my trip to Stuttgart. My first posting experience of Tripadvisor was a wonderful one indeed because all of you. I know that I will definitely enjoy Stuttgart and Germany. Thanks again!!
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